One chance.
One throw. Straight through the window.
Kill a few screens.
Sever political means.
That’s the plan.
It’s what Roger will do.
He will.
He has to.
Chapter 87
The plan goes as follows.
Roger finds everything he needs, plus a few big rocks to give the bag some weight.
It smells pretty bad. Roger can barely notice the stench but even that is saying a hell of a lot. Roger can’t usually smell trash.
At around midnight Roger is walking the in area of the TV store. He passes by a few times, but there’s a car driving by or someone walking or something messing up the timing, which is fine because Roger has all night.
Finally, on the fourth pass, Roger gets his opportunity. The window shatters and every TV in the display window crashes back onto the floor of the store. Some of the falling television sets even bring down a few things hanging on the walls on the sides.
An alarm goes off.
Roger runs.
No one sees him.
The whole thing couldn’t have gone any better than it did.
Chapter 88
His spot by the river is okay now. Being there still makes him think about that bastard Bob, but he also thinks now about his grand accomplishment he achieved last night. Roger’s wanted to see what going on there, but figures another day would be best to wait before he goes there.
Just in case.
Wouldn’t want to ruin the good feeling going right now.
The next day Roger walks by the TV store. ‘Closed until further notice’ a sign hangs on the front door.
Good.
Maybe they’ll quit playing that shit on their TVs, maybe they’ll quit selling TVs, maybe they’ll see this as one of those mind altering experiences, maybe they’ll realize how much commodity shit they’re swimming through.
Maybe…
Probably not.
They’ll keep going with their shit-swimming lives, they’ll have their insurance cover it, they’ll buy security cameras, they’ll see it as an attack on their pride, on their country, on their fucking fake-ass freedom.
They’ll vote for Robert Goldsmith.
Chapter 89
Shitfur is back. Gone for almost a week this time.
Where’s he going?
And when the hell is he going to be gone for good?
Chapter 90
It must be Christmas.
Christ.
Santa Clause is walking through the park wearing the jolly red and white suit.
“Ho! Ho! Ho!”
That suit must be hotter than hell right now. Must be trying to sweat off some pounds. That’s the American Spirit, too lazy to exercise so just throw a wool, red Santa Suit on.
That’ll help.
Everybody loves Santa too.
Christ.
Chapter 91
The day after, Roger receives a visit from an unwanted guest. That really doesn’t narrow down much because that’s everyone for Roger, but this is one of those less than unwanted peoples.
It’s not the ghost of Christmas past.
It’s not the police asking about the vandalism he committed.
It’s not God.
It’s worse.
A social worker.
A fervid one.
Damn it.
Tis the season.
“Excuse me, sir.”
Roger doesn’t respond. They’re in the park near the river right now.
“Um, sir.” She reaches down to tap him on the shoulder. “Hello there. My name is Elisabeth Grinkley. How are you doing?”
Roger looks up and glares at the Miss Elisabeth. She’s as pretty as they come, twice-a-day-shower-lady pretty. Disgusting.
“Fine.”
“Oh that’s good. Did you have a good Christmas?”
“Cheery.”
Elisabeth fidgets once.
“I’m happy the hear that.”
Roger can’t tell which he can smell more; her eighty-dollar-comes-from-the-glands-of-a-rare-orchid-in-some-remote-loaction shampoo or her priceless sympathy drooling from the corners of her mouth as she talks.
There’s a pause.
“I’m here to help you out, to get you back on your feet.”
It has to be the sympathy he’s smelling.
“To get you off of the streets and into a nice warm bed, to give you a fresh start on your life, to help you find a job, but most of all, I’m here to be your friend.”
Jesus Christ, this one is a fresh one. Must be her first or second time.
Roger stares at her in silence.
She fidgets again.
“What’s your name?”
“Roger.”
“Hello, Roger.” She’s so excited. This is definitely her first time. That explains the nervousness, the directness and the forgetfulness.
Roger’s met so many social workers in his life, he knows the whole routine. She forgot to tell him she’s from the Department of Social Services, she’s wearing too much perfume, she’s dressed in too revealing of clothing, she probably even forgot to bring some food in order to ask if Roger is hungry.
“So, is this your home?”
“No.”
“Do you have a home?”
“A home as in a house? No.”
She starts to choke up out of pity for Roger. “Well, well I am here to help you with that. We offer a program called Second Chance which,” She pauses to sniffle, “which is there to support you in getting back on track.”
Here comes the shitty analogy about getting back on the horse.
“Think of it like falling down and breaking your ankle. You can’t walk with a broken ankle, right? But in the mean time you use crutches until you are healed and can walk on your own again. Second Chance is that pair of crutches that can help you back to full health.”
Haven’t heard that one before. She’s a natural.
“Did you break your ankle? Did something happen that knocked you down and held you there?”
“No.”
“It’s okay. It’s safe here, you can tell me anything.”
She’s a regular fucking do-gooder.
Time to go.
Roger gets up and starts walking away. He’s had enough of this girl.
“Oh, where are you going?”
“I’m going home.”
She follows him. “But, uh, I thought you said you didn’t have a home?”
“Thanks for reminding me.”
“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t…” Elisabeth is completely unaware of the sarcasm. She’s so blinded by her sympathy. “Will you please stop just for a second? I’m trying to help you.”
“Help me by leaving me alone.”
“But don’t you want to have a job so you can make money to pay for food and shelter?”
Roger stops. “Do you hear yourself?”
“Well, um, yes, but I don’t know what you mean?”
“Am I dead?”
“I don’t think so?”
“Then I don’t need a job to pay for food, do I?”
“Well I guess not.” Her voice is quivering, but with a befuddled tone.
“And I don’t need a job to pay for shelter, do I?”
“But you could live comfortably, be a positive part of society. You could make something of yourself.”
“And a job defines who someone is, that right? How much money, which is just paper given value by man’s imagination, how much of that defines who you are?”
“Not really, no. But it is something someone does.” She somehow completely misses the second question.
Roger ignores it.“Jesus, they’ve got you good. Brainwashed, dried and shrunk. Here you are feeling sorry for me when it’s you who you should be feeling sorry for.”
“I, uh-“
“You have a nice house?”
“Um, it’s an apartment.”
<
br /> “Nice furniture? And a car?”
“Yes.”
“And I suppose you worked really hard to earn all of that shit?”
“I did, very hard.” She sniffles a little bit, but perks up with a bit pride upon saying this.
“And what do think you’re going to do with that when you are dead?”
“I, um, I guess if I have kids they will get it.”
Roger starts walking away again.
“Wait hang on.” She catches up.
“I don’t understand what you mean.”
“Never mind, leave me alone. Go gorge your materialistic ego with play-dough.”
Chapter 92
Roger thinks about Miss Elisabeth the next day, about how used to brainwashing she is. That’s why she listened to him, that’s why she can’t think for herself.
None of her thoughts are her own. Is that her fault? Who’s to blame for this travesty?
What a mess this place has become.
The filth is everywhere.
Landfills bigger than some lakes.
Birthday kids and their cakes.
Liars and the fakes.
Nature has created a monster.
A virus.
Mankind.
And Man’s not stopping with the physical world. He’s infected emotions and thoughts and morals and well-being and culture and tradition and life and living.
Everything.
Exhaust resources.
Move.
Exhaust resources.
Move.
Exhaust resources.
Move.
A virus.
They better not figure out how to spread from poor Mother Earth to the next sorry sucker of a planet.
Chapter 93
Shitfur is gone again. Back for three or four days, then disappears again.
This could be the last time. He’s gone for longer than he stays. Roger hopes this is the last time. He’s sick of this damned cat messing with his life.
The TV store is all fixed up and open to sell people one of the greatest misused tools in the name of information.
So that’s great.
The pizza buffet has been getting busier, which means more food for Roger, but that comes at a price. It means consumers are consuming more.
So that’s nice.
On his way back to the river Roger sees that a jewelry store is closing down, probably due to a lack of sales.
That is good.
Not sarcastic good, either. Actually good.
Maybe the owner, or previous owner, will realize how insane, how ridiculous, how fucking useless, frivolous, how vain it is to have owned a jewelry shop. Maybe they’ll start asking questions about their lifestyle. Questions like:
What purpose does jewelry serve?
Is it necessary?
Could there be something else to life other than pretty, shiny things?
Maybe.
But probably not.
What’ll end up happening is the previous owner’ll end up in some other tangled web. They’ll cry for a while, like a baby who lost their sanu or binky or something, then regroup, re-brainwash, rinse and dry and go out to try to prove themselves once more.
Roger can only hope they fail.
And fail again.
Fail until they reach a breaking point.
Death or life with a deeper meaning.
Maybe that’ll happen.
But probably not.
Chapter 94
For only the second time since he’s been here, there is no food at the pizza buffet spot. They’re open for business. There should be food.
Maybe it’s dumpster day.
Roger doesn’t know what day it is.
It could be dumpster day. It wasn’t very full yesterday though.
Better check the mom and pop stop.
There’s food there. Half the dumpster is full.
That doesn’t make any sense. They’re on the same trash route, Roger’s pretty sure of that.
There’s a variety of possibilities as to why this is happening, but there’s only a few that have a much higher probability.
One. The pizza buffet needed to have an emergency dumpster emptying, they have been busy. The problem with that is that it wasn’t very full yesterday. And there’s still trash in the dumpster, just nothing to eat.
Two. Number two. There’s another bum in the neighborhood who knows about the spot.
God damn it. It more than likely the latter of the two.
That’s just what Roger could use right now.
Company.
Competition.
A flunk-floozy-loser who wants to be like them, who can’t tell a cat from a dog, who’s just too bent up on being depressed they can’t think or feel anything else.
That’s just what Roger needs.
A bum burn out.
And there’s really no way Roger can rule this out.
Great.
Chapter 95
As far as Roger can tell it’s just the pizza buffet place that’s been raided. It’s okay, it’s just one spot. It would have been better if it had been any other spot because the pizza buffet is a gold mine. It’s the best spot out of all the others. As far as the food spots go.
The river and the park are the best spots out of everything. Food stops can be replaced. Finding another spot on the river and another park to sleep in is a hell of a lot harder than finding another food spot.
Roger can’t afford to lose these places.
He won’t.
Not this god damn time. He’ll fight for it this time.
There’s no way he’ll lose this spot.
He was the first one here, the only one here. He’s not going to give it up.
Chapter 96
It’s been almost two weeks and no Shitfur.
No food at the pizza place, either.
Nothing good can ever happen without some bullshit to taint its sweet taste. It’s like getting a steak but it’s covered in cough syrup or penicillin or something.
That’s how it is.
And if the steak is ruined, Roger needs to rectify the situation by finding out just who decided to shit on it.
Stake out for the on-the-steak shitter.
Whoever it is better be ready to move on with their lives because they sure as hell won’t be staying here.
This is Roger’s place.
And if Shitfur is truly gone, then this is the best place to be.
That’s why Roger is going to fight.
That’s why Roger is hiding in the bushes near the dumpster behind the pizza buffet right now.
Tonight.
He’s going to catch that son of a bitch and tell them just what’s going to happen.
Chapter 97
No one comes.
Nothing but a drunkard looking for a place to puke. He finds the right spot.
Chapter 98
Roger falls asleep the second night of the stake out. A deep sleep. A quiet sleep. And it’s then, somewhere around just before sunrise that he’s woken up.
Something’s licking his face.
It’s Shitfur. Roger can’t see the cat because of how dark it is, but he can tell just by the slimy-worn-down-sand-paper feel of the tongue that it’s Shitfur.
Damn it.
Shitfur is back. Roger really thought he was gone for good this time. Two weeks is long time to be gone and still come back.
But here he is, Shitstain-shitbrain-kicked-in-the-head-as-a-kitten Shitfur.
Roger suddenly realizes what he’s been doing and why he’s here in the bushes near the pizza buffet dumpster.
He looks around quickly, alertly.
Nobody.
It couldn’t have been just Shitfur eating all of that food. That’s too much food for a cat. And if Shitfur was actually in the area, there’s no way he could resist coming to annoy Roger. No way.
There has to be someone else who’s getting into Roger’s food. Some bum-shit-can’t-get-a-thought-through
-an-empty-space-void-called-a-brain-lame-lead-head-better-off-dead vagabond.
That’s who. A pushed over.
And just at that moment Roger hears someone coming. Someone with something that sounds like wheels. It’s quiet at first, but it’s getting louder.
It’s coming from the beginning of the alley.
Closer.
Closer.
The something passes into the lighting of an overhead lamp. It’s followed by the someone.
Jesus Christ, It’s a shopping cart.
And it’s fucking Maynard at the helm.
Shitfur purrs and rubs against Roger.
There’s no way.
No.
Not Maynard.
Not the shopping cart.
Not the ghost of Christmas past.
Not Maynard.
Think fast. New plan. Stay quiet, stay put. Maynard doesn’t know anyone is here. Just stay put. Don’t make a move.
Maynard goes to the dumpster and digs around for a minute. He pulls out an empty box of pizza and throws it in his cart. Maynard opens the box and starts throwing half eaten slices from the dumpster into it.
So that’s where all of it is going. Maynard’s the bastard who’s been stockpiling worse than a bear before hibernation.
Stay quiet.
Don’t let that son of bitch know who’s here.
Maynard has almost a full box of pizza when something happens.
“Meow.”
He stops filling the box, looks around, not sure of where the sound came from. “Rogercat? Is that you?”
Rogercat? What the hell is that? His name is Shitfur, and Shitfur better shut the fuck up right now.
Roger goes to snatch Shitfur, but the cat’s too quick. He jumps out of the hiding place and goes over to Maynard.
“Oh it is you, Rogles. I thought you left me again.”
Rogles? Holy shit.
Wait.
What?
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